Early trends | BJP may win election and yet lose pole position in NDA

The ruling National Democratic Alliance (NDA) is likely to make history and return to power for a third consecutive term, the initial trends suggest.

The good news for the NDA is that it is returning to power but the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) seems to be facing a setback. For the first time in a decade, it seems that the BJP may not get a majority on its own if the initial trends are to be believed.

“The NDA is set to form government as expected. It is an election and numbers will change and NDA will be comfortable,” RP Singh, national spokesperson of the BJP, told The Federal.

Power for allies

While the NDA seems to be on its way to power, the problem for the BJP is that the alliance partners will play a more dominant role in the functioning of the Union government for the next five years. It will not be the BJP leadership that will dictate terms to its allies.

The outcome of the national polls also gives a reality check to the BJP-NDA combine that the issues of unemployment and price rise are real and the new government will have to find answers to these burning issues.

Delay in major decisions

The initial trends of the national elections suggest the BJP leadership will have to rethink its strategy to deliver on the poll promises of Uniform Civil Code (UCC), One Nation, One Poll and implementation of Citizenship Amendment Act (CAA), these issues had mostly been opposed by the NDA partners.

The challenges for the BJP are also significant because most of its partners have supported the idea of a pan-India caste-based census and changes in the reservation policy as demanded by the Opposition parties for the past few months.

“The dominance of the BJP within the NDA seems to be over and it is the alliance partners who will dictate terms to the functioning of the Union government in the coming days. The BJP leadership may not be able to implement some of its crucial decisions that it promised during the election campaign,” Ashutosh Kumar, political science professor at Panjab University, told The Federal.

UCC implementation

The idea of implementing the UCC nationally is also likely to face setback as all the alliance parties of NDA are unwilling to support the idea and Bihar Chief Minister Nitish Kumar and chief of Telugu Desam Party (TDP) N Chandrababu Naidu have openly stated that there was no need for UCC in their states.

“The role of TDP chief Chandrababu Naidu will be crucial along with Nitish Kumar. It will not easy to meet the demands of NDA partners all the time for the union government under BJP,” said Kumar.